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Sunday, October 25, 2015

Storage Folder for Dies

I got a bit fed up with my various Christmas dies being in different places meaning that finding the one I wanted was a pain. I thought it was about time I got them organised, and as while looking for something else I'd unearthed the magnetic sheets and zipped wallets I had left after making the last one I thought this was a good time to make a dedicated Christmas version of the folder. I don't think I ever got round to sharing photos of the other two I've made, so I'm going to blog this while I remember!

The covers are made from that thick board you sometimes get in packaging - it's about 3mm thick, so good and sturdy. The spine section is made from empty cereal packet - it needed to be a bit thinner to curve around, covering the binding wiresThe flat covers measure about 20.5 x 24.5, I used some 12x12 papers to cover the flat pieces and the spine section. I used the scoring board and bone folder to make the flat margins on either side of the spine, then curved the rest around a pot to "teach" the spine the shape I wanted it to haveI keep the covers plain because they go on the shelf like library books and I don't want any bits falling off or taking up extra space

Inside I used 12x A5 zipped wallets.With my Bind-It-All machine I punched holes in the flat cover pieces, and matching holes in the wallets, then used Bind-It-All wires to fix it all together. I then curved the spine section and glued into place, using strong bulldog clips to hold it all together while the glue dried

The A4 magnetic sheets were cut in half to fit inside the wallets, then I sorted the dies out to fit. Tor the facing page I created a guide for what's on each magnetic page -so I know the manufacturer and name of the dies, and I can tell if anything is missing!I try to remember to save a picture of each new die set I buy, then I can copy the pictures, resize if necessary and add to the the label page - this also means that I can easily make new versions if I need to move things arund, or add another picture/die to a page where there is space, such as on the one below.I then resize the whole sheet to a size/shape that fits, print out, trim and add to the folder

These sheets are only magnetic on one side, so having the printed sheet tucked in behind there works pretty well,I do like to have the pictures there for reference, but I got a bit lazy and some of the pages are a bit "half done" ;_ I can do back and do them properly if I feel the urge.....

The shock was getting to the last of the sets I needed to file, and realising that I'd filled all but one of the wallets already, so if I buy more Christmas dies I'll be (almost) back at square one!

These folders work really well, you can store a lot of dies in a fairly small space, and they sit neatly on the shelf where they are easy to grab wand flick through when you want to use the dies. So that's what I've been doing rather than getting on and using all these dies to make some Christmas cards.... hey ho, maybe it will help - at least now I know what I've got!Thanks for looking

Great project Kathy and how I store most of my dies. The smaller sets have magnetic sheets in CD cases to keep them all together and are stored in seperate pages with the larger dies. It makes such a difference to know where they are!Lainexx

LOL, Kathy, what are we like with our dies, this is a fabulous way to store, them, great project and fabulous step by step too...I bought some storage for mines, but wanted to die cut, each die I have so that I know, from whom I had bought them, a project for a rainy day, I think...hugs xxx